1. Instruction Representation III (1) Fall 2007 Lecture 11: Disassembly and Pseudo-instructions

2. Instruction Representation III (2) Fall 2007 Decoding Machine Language How do we convert 1s and 0s to C code? Machine language  C? For each 32 bits: Look at opcode : 0 means R-Format, 2 or 3 mean J-Format, otherwise I-Format. Use instruction type to determine which fields exist. Write out MIPS assembly code, converting each field to name, register number/name, or decimal/hex number. Logically convert this MIPS code into valid C code. Always possible? Unique?

3. Instruction Representation III (3) Fall 2007 Decoding Example (1/7) Here are six machine language instructions in hexadecimal: 00001025 hex 0005402A hex 11000003 hex 00441020 hex 20A5FFFF hex 08100001 hex Let the first instruction be at address 4,194,304 ten (0x00400000 hex ). Next step: convert hex to binary

4. Instruction Representation III (4) Fall 2007 Decoding Example (2/7) The six machine language instructions in binary: 00000000000000000001000000100101 00000000000001010100000000101010 00010001000000000000000000000011 00000000010001000001000000100000 00100000101001011111111111111111 00001000000100000000000000000001 Next step: identify opcode and format 1, 4-31 rsrtimmediate 0rsrtrdfunctshamt R I J target address 2 or 3

5. Instruction Representation III (5) Fall 2007 Decoding Example (3/7) Select the opcode (first 6 bits) to determine the format: 00000000000000000001000000100101 00000000000001010100000000101010 00010001000000000000000000000011 00000000010001000001000000100000 00100000101001011111111111111111 00001000000100000000000000000001 Look at opcode : 0 means R-Format, 2 or 3 mean J-Format, otherwise I-Format. Next step: separation of fields R R I R I J Format:

6. Instruction Representation III (6) Fall 2007 Decoding Example (4/7) Fields separated based on format/opcode: 0002370 0058420 480+3 0242320 855 21,048,577 Next step: translate (“disassemble”) to MIPS assembly instructions R R I R I J Format:

7. Instruction Representation III (7) Fall 2007 Decoding Example (5/7) MIPS Assembly (Part 1): Address:Assembly instructions: 0x00400000 or $2,$0,$0 0x00400004 slt $8,$0,$5 0x00400008 beq $8,$0,3 0x0040000c add $2,$2,$4 0x00400010 addi $5,$5,-1 0x00400014 j 0x100001 Better solution: translate to more meaningful MIPS instructions (fix the branch/jump and add labels, registers)

8. Instruction Representation III (8) Fall 2007 Decoding Example (6/7) MIPS Assembly (Part 2): or $v0,$0,$0 Loop:slt $t0,$0,$a1 beq $t0,$0,Exit add $v0,$v0,$a0 addi $a1,$a1,-1 j Loop Exit: Next step: translate to C code (be creative!)

9. Instruction Representation III (9) Fall 2007 Decoding Example (7/7) After C code (Mapping below) $v0 : product $a0 : multiplicand $a1 : multiplier product = 0; while (multiplier > 0) { product += multiplicand; multiplier -= 1; } Before Hex: 00001025 hex 0005402A hex 11000003 hex 00441020 hex 20A5FFFF hex 08100001 hex Demonstrated Idea: Instructions are just numbers, code is treated like data or $v0,$0,$0 Loop: slt $t0,$0,$a1 beq $t0,$0,Exit add $v0,$v0,$a0 addi $a1,$a1,-1 j Loop Exit:

10. Instruction Representation III (10) Fall 2007 A useful instruction: lui So how does lui help us? Example: addi $t0,$t0, 0xABABCDCD becomes: lui $at, 0xABAB ori $at, $at, 0xCDCD add $t0,$t0,$at Now each I-format instruction has only a 16- bit immediate. Wouldn’t it be nice if the assembler would do this for us automatically? -If number too big, then just automatically replace addi with lui, ori, add

11. Instruction Representation III (11) Fall 2007 True Assembly Language (1/3) Pseudoinstruction: A MIPS instruction that doesn’t turn directly into a machine language instruction, but into other MIPS instructions What happens with pseudoinstructions? They’re broken up by the assembler into several “real” MIPS instructions.

12. Instruction Representation III (12) Fall 2007 Example Pseudoinstructions Register Move movereg2,reg1 Expands to: addreg2,$zero,reg1 Load Immediate lireg,value If value fits in 16 bits: addireg,$zero,value else: luireg,upper 16 bits of value orireg,$zero,lower 16 bits

13. Instruction Representation III (13) Fall 2007 True Assembly Language (2/3) Problem: When breaking up a pseudoinstruction, the assembler may need to use an extra reg. If it uses any regular register, it’ll overwrite whatever the program has put into it. Solution: Reserve a register ( $1, called $at for “assembler temporary”) that assembler will use to break up pseudo-instructions. Since the assembler may use this at any time, it’s not safe to code with it.

14. Instruction Representation III (14) Fall 2007 Example Pseudoinstructions Rotate Right Instruction rorreg, value Expands to: srl$at, reg, value sllreg, reg, 32-value orreg, reg, $at 0 0 “No OPeration” instruction nop Expands to instruction = 0 ten, sll$0, $0, 0

15. Instruction Representation III (15) Fall 2007 Example Pseudoinstructions Wrong operation for operand addureg,reg,value # should be addiu If value fits in 16 bits, addu is changed to: addiureg,reg,value else: lui$at,upper 16 bits of value ori$at,$at,lower 16 bits addureg,reg,$at How do we avoid confusion about whether we are talking about MIPS assembler with or without pseudoinstructions?

16. Instruction Representation III (16) Fall 2007 True Assembly Language (3/3) MAL (MIPS Assembly Language): the set of instructions that a programmer may use to code in MIPS; this includes pseudoinstructions TAL (True Assembly Language): set of instructions that can actually get translated into a single machine language instruction (32-bit binary string) A program must be converted from MAL into TAL before translation into 1s & 0s.

17. Instruction Representation III (17) Fall 2007 Questions on Pseudoinstructions Question: How does MIPS recognize pseudo- instructions? Answer: It looks for officially defined pseudo- instructions, such as ror and move It looks for special cases where the operand is incorrect for the operation and tries to handle it gracefully

18. Instruction Representation III (18) Fall 2007 MAL v. TAL MAL: li $v0,0 Loop:bge $zero,$a1,Exit add $v0,$v0,$a0 sub $a1,$a1,1 j Loop Exit: TAL: or $v0,$0,$0 Loop:slt $t0,$0,$a1 beq $t0,$0,Exit add $v0,$v0,$a0 addi $a1,$a1,-1 j Loop Exit:

19. Instruction Representation III (19) Fall 2007 Quickie Quiz Which of the instructions below are MAL and which are TAL? A.addi $t0, $t1, 40000 B.beq $s0, 10, Exit C.sub $t0, $t1, 1 ABC 1: MMM 2: MMT 3: MTM 4: MTT 5: TMM 6: TMT 7: TTM 8: TTT

20. Instruction Representation III (20) Fall 2007 Answer Which of the instructions below are MAL and which are TAL? i. addi $t0, $t1, 40000 ii. beq $s0, 10, Exit iii. sub $t0, $t1, 1 40,000 > +32,767 => lui, ori sub: both must be registers; even if it was subi, there is no subi in TAL; generates addi $t0,$t1, -1 Beq: both must be registers Exit: if > 2 15, then MAL ABC 1: MMM 2: MMT 3: MTM 4: MTT 5: TMM 6: TMT 7: TTM 8: TTT

21. Instruction Representation III (21) Fall 2007 In conclusion Disassembly is simple and starts by decoding opcode field. Be creative, efficient when authoring C Assembler expands real instruction set (TAL) with pseudoinstructions (MAL) Only TAL can be converted to raw binary Assembler’s job to do conversion Assembler uses reserved register $at MAL makes it much easier to write MIPS